In the Future
by wraith-goddess
Summary: What happens after a couple of decades and now there are teenagers in Atlantis?


**I don't own Stargate Atlantis.**

**A/N: This is based on the outrageous assumption that Stargate Atlantis lasts until its twenty fifth season (500 episodes). I'll have you know now; I will take a few artistic liberties with the events over the course of the entire series. Feel free to disregard anything you don't like. My view of how the series might end.**

**Chapter One: Going "Home"**

_Chapter One – Atlantis Base – Pegasus Galaxy – 2029 _

John Sheppard shouldered his pack and walked out of his corner room, with balcony, just as he had done for the better part of the last twenty five years of his life. He was fifty five years of age and beginning to feel the effects of all his years in the service of his country, world and galaxy, having been thirty years old when called to embark on an exploration to a lost world heard of only in legend.

Every coming day brought a new surprise for the battle-seasoned warrior. The one thing that always stayed the same was change. Living in a different galaxy brought on the adrenaline rush of waking up every day wondering what would be thrown at you next. The people of the Atlantis expedition took their lives into their hands at every moment of the day, from waking up to lying down to sleep at night.

As John walked down the halls, he saw the same faces he recognized. He interacted with the same people as he did yesterday and the day before and the last two and a half decades. There were teenagers running around, they considered themselves to be normal, even though they grew up speaking both English and the altered form of Latin the Ancients used, and some of their best friends were aliens. Some of the children were half-alien themselves.

In 2010, Cassandra Fraiser Hernandez and her husband, Dominic, relocated to Atlantis with their six year old son, Beris. Cassandra insisted that her son be named after a childhood friend who had been lost in the plague Niirti unleashed on Hanka. He had to sign a confidentiality agreement once before because he was injured defending Cassandra's honor, and she brought him to the SGC. The wedding was held in the embarkation room of Stargate Command, which posed a problem if he had not been given proper security clearance.

As a result of the Ancients retaking control of Atlantis, a new Z.P.M. was installed in the city's power link, and another sent through to Stargate Command. This was, of course, after we proved ourselves to be a useful species in the fight against the wraith. After one occasion of Rodney McKay's amazing superhero powers to save the city from total annihilation at the very last second, the Ancients were so grateful that they gave us control of Atlantis, permanently. They kept contact as friends and Allies in case we ever had any questions about any of the systems or devices in the city.

With the two functioning Z.P.M.'s, back and forth contact between Earth and Pegasus was normal. Of course, it made things a little bit hard on the teenagers who inhabited the city, because not only did they have to make an intergalactic trip back and forth every weekend for driver's Ed classes, most of them had the A.T.A. gene, so they were taking pilot's Ed classes on Atlantis. John Sheppard declared that he would teach the next generation of children to fly puddle jumpers until the day he died.

Education was another issue that had to be resolved. The Ancients were eager to take on students so that they could revive a lost way of life. The children were given a choice. They could either remain in Atlantis full time and be home schooled by their parents, they could go and study with the Ancients in a kind of boarding school environment, they could go to a boarding school on Earth and come "home" to Atlantis to visit once a month, or they could go to public school on Earth, which meant getting up forty minutes before other children for the extra leg of the commute.

Most of the parents would have rather home-schooled their children, but most pupils were excited at the chance to have aliens for teachers. A great many others chose the boarding schools on Earth, free from many of the long arms of parenthood that adolescents seek to escape. Very few took the public school route, they were too different. They were born on a different world, despite having primarily human parents and they didn't fit in like other kids did.

For many years, the strain of fighting a forbidding enemy took a high emotional toll on the inhabitants of Atlantis. More than one good man turned his gun on himself. The suicide count among minors was a much smaller number. Only two teenagers took that way out and their deaths further racked the nerves of the city until it felt as though she might break under the weight.

Atlantis was always referred to in the female sense. Much like the way men would refer to a car or a boat back on Earth. This was because if you weren't careful and loving and treated her right, she would turn her back on you, but in the end, some small part of her would always protect you with a maternal sense of warm familiarity after a long frigid day of battle.

A common theme arose with the teenagers. The normal teenage rebellious phase seemed to be somehow amplified by the alien D.N.A. Senior prank night invariably included something to do with the Stargate. One boy got in a lot of trouble for reconfiguring the I.D.C. reader and almost locked out SGA-7. His own mother threw him in the brig for a week. In Atlantis, you didn't get grounded, you got lock-up.

Not only that, the deaths had a pattern to them. Both of the suicides took place on the West Pier. I guess some things never change no matter where you go. Almost all kids and teenagers love the sunsets. Maybe they wanted the last thing they ever saw to be something that was beautiful. No one will ever know for sure. Only one left a note.

As John looked out over his pristine view of the city, he was painfully reminded that this day was not going to be like all the others. The I.O.A. repealed the expedition for reasons that "were not to be made clear until such time as was deemed necessary for the clarity of the situation to be revealed." He would not fall asleep in the same bed he had slept in for twenty five years. He was going back to Earth, never to see Atlantis again. The Ancients were moving back in to take care of their city. Everyone was packing up and returning to a home world they no longer considered to be their home. They had to settle into a life that contented most people, and suffer through the boredom of not having the opportunity to save the world.

The children had to adjust to trying to be normal kids. In Atlantis a teenage girl would be free to talk about something that her boyfriend, the Junior Ambassador to MX4-677, had brought back for her, but on Earth she had to be careful. They stuck together in packs and became the outcasts. They dodged glances whenever they went to the mall, because fashion had an entirely different meaning a few million light-years away.

The teen years were still the most vicious of their lives, but for some reason, in Atlantis you were more accepted. Perhaps it was the looming possibility of impending doom at all hours of the day and night that kept most people on friendly terms. They often wondered if they insulted someone, would they or the person they insulted die before they could apologize for what was said.

Every child was taught hand to hand combat beginning at the age of four, gun safety was learned by age ten, and alien warfare technology mastered by twelve. A teenager's idea of a fun Friday night activity after school was to go to a cloaked "Safeworld" with an indoor arena and have a few hours of sparring matches. Not only that, it was recommended that every citizen should carry a personal weapon, knife or gun, from age thirteen onward.

This affinity for semi-violent physical activity was not strictly limited to the males. Teyla had been voted the top role model for girls aged six to fourteen for ten years running, followed closely by Elizabeth Weir.

Paint ball was not an option, not when each teenager had handled a P-90 when he or she was eight years old. A paint ball gun, having no function except to shoot brightly colored gel balloons, bored them. There was too little risk of actual injury. A different Safeworld, still cloaked, was entirely covered in dense vegetation, perfect for stun battles. Sign up sheets were posted and every Friday night, anywhere from twenty to forty teenagers would check out wraith stunners from the armory and run around until 2630 Atlantis standard time on the outdoor Safeworld having fun shooting each other. The intensity of the weapons was severely dialed down after one girl ended up in the infirmary for multiple blasts from her brothers ganging up on her.

There were also very few overweight children, due mostly to the fact that there was an absence of high fat and high calorie food, and that children had more fun running around and burning energy than doing pretty much anything else. There was no broadcast television in Atlantis, and the only formal internet was between the laboratories. It took away most of the laziness time that ate into an Earth adolescent's day. The other reason was that everybody had to be in shape. It was one of the city's laws. If there was an evacuation, you had to keep up with everybody else, which made P.E. a lot stricter.

In seventh grade, the standard for passing Physical Education was that each student had to be able to swim all the way around the city in less than twenty minutes. They never had anyone fail. In eighth grade, you had to have a time a maximum of ten minutes slower than Ronon for running a specified course around the city. No one ever failed that either. In ninth grade, you had to put the two elements together. It was required that you swim a lap around the city, then climb out and run the course. If you finished in under forty five minutes, you passed. 0 fail rate.

The students appeared to be determined to be their best not only physically but academically as well. Having begun their education with the ancients, it seemed like they ushered in a generation of geniuses. Standard math for fourteen year olds was introductory calculus. John rolled his eyes and scoffed, mainly due to the fact that he never took calculus.

All this wandered around in John Sheppard's mind until he was brought back to the world sharply.

"Are you ready to go John?" A voice came from behind him.

"I'll never be ready to leave Atlantis. I have too many memories here. I feel like this is my home world and I'm going on a one way expedition to an alien one. Do we really have to leave?"

"The I.O.A. was final. I'll let you be the last one through."

"Thanks."

As John walked slowly and pensively up to the naquadah ring he knew so well, he thought over all the things he would be leaving behind. Every step carried a significance of arguing with Rodney or gearing up with Ronon or sparring with Teyla. The floor reminded him of his first step into the city and how he would be taking his last step out of it. As he looked up at the shimmering event horizon, he turned around on last time. The sun glinted through the stained glass windows of the control room casting prisms onto the walls. The look on his face clearly said, 'Drag me away from here, because I never want to leave.'

"Sheppard, are you coming through?" A voice came in through his radio.

"Don't get your panties in a twist Sergeant, I'll be right there."

And with a reluctant sigh, Major General John Sheppard stepped through the event horizon and left what was the closest to a permanent home he had ever had, behind.

**A/N: Well, there's chapter one, I hope you enjoyed it.**


End file.
